Saddam hanging spurs joy in Iran, Kuwait, ire among Saudis

By Haaretz Service and News Agencies

Haaretz

Tevet 10, 5767

News of the
hanging of Saddam Hussein stirred rejoicing among arch-enemies Iran and
Kuwait, but caused shock and seething anger among Palestinians and other
supporters of the former Iraqi leader, with Saudis and many other Arabs
outraged at his hanging on the holiest day of the Muslim
year.

Kuwaitis and Iranians welcomed the death of the leader who
led wars against each of their countries.

"This is the best Eid
gift for humanity," said Saad bin Tafla al-Ajmi, former information
minister of Kuwait, referring to Eid al-Adha, the most important holiday
on the Islamic calendar, which began Saturday for Sunni
Muslims.

Al-Ajmi heads a state committee that is searching for 605
people who disappeared during Saddam's seven-month occupation of
Kuwait that began in 1990. He said the families of the missing were
"ecstatic."

"This is the fair punishment for the one who executed
our sons without trials," he said.

The drama of Saddam's
violent end on Saturday was brought into living rooms across the Arab
world with television pictures of masked hangmen tightening the noose
around his neck. Separate film of Saddam's body in a white shroud also
upset many viewers.

In Iran, which fought an eight-year war with
Iraq that killed hundreds of thousands of people on both sides after
Saddam invaded in 1980, most people thought he got what he
deserved.

"Death was the least punishment for Saddam," said Hasan
Mohebi, a fruit vendor in Tehran. "He destroyed the lives of millions of
people in this region."

For university student Sareh Naghavi,
Saddam's death came too soon. "He should have been made to answer why he
invaded Iran and Kuwait and why he launched chemical attacks against
Iranians and Iraqis," she said.

In Iraq, the reaction was muted in
most areas of Baghdad. But in Sadr City, the city's largest Shiite
enclave, people spilled into the streets to celebrate Saddam's hanging.
They sang and danced. Passing cars honked.

"God will give him his
punishment," said Laila Nagi Habib, 42, a Shiite and homemaker who lives
outside Sadr City. "I hate him, but he can no longer feel my hate now that
he is dead."

But many Palestinians, who had seen him as an Arab
hero for his missile attacks on Israel during the 1991 Gulf War, voiced
shock at the Saturday execution. "The Americans wanted to tell all Arab
leaders who are their servants that they are like Saddam, nothing but a
sheep slaughtered on Eid," said Abu Mohammad Salama at a Gaza mosque.

Hamas lawmaker Mushir al-Masri said Saddam's execution was a
"proof of the criminal and terrorist American policy and its war against
all forces of resistance in the world".

In the United States, many
Iraqi Americans greeted the news of Saddam's execution with celebration.
Other Americans, protesting against the war, strongly condemned the
hanging.

Debate over timing of executionMany Arabs said
his hanging for crimes against humanity was provocatively timed to
coincide with Eid al-Adha and would worsen violence in Iraq.

"This
is the worst Eid ever witnessed by Muslims. I had goosebumps when I saw
the footage," said Jordanian woman Rana Abdullah, 30, who works in the
private sector.

Leading Sunni Muslim Arab power Saudi Arabia
criticised Iraq's Shi'ite leaders for executing Saddam, also a Sunni,
during the Eid al-Adha and said his trial had been politicized.

"There is a feeling of surprise and disapproval that the verdict
has been applied during the holy months and the first days of Eid
al-Adha," a presenter on the official al-Ikhbariya TV said after
programming was broken to read a statement.

"Leaders of Islamic
countries should show respect for this blessed occasion ... not demean
it," said the statement, which was attributed to official news agency
SPA's political analyst.

Hesham Kassem, an Egyptian newspaper
publisher and human rights activist, said airing the images was
controversial, but dded: "This man was one of the most brutal mass
murderers in the history of mankind. He stands alongside Hitler and
Stalin."

But in the impoverished Iraqi village where Saddam was
born, residents vowed revenge. "We will all become a bomb," said one young
man in Awja, 150 km (90 miles) north of Baghdad.

Libya, the only
state to show solidarity with Saddam in his death, declared three days of
mourning and cancelled public Eid celebrations. Flags on government
buildings flew at half-mast.

While many Arab governments refrained
from comment, a senior aide to Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa
called the execution "a tragic end to a sad phase in Iraq's history".

"We hope that the Iraqi people would focus on the future to be
able to pass this stage, stop the violence and achieve reconciliation,"
Hesham Youssef told Reuters in Cairo.

The government of Iraqi
neighbor Jordan said it hoped the execution would not have "any negative
repercussions".

Abdel-Bari Atwan, editor of the London-based
Al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper, said Arabs wondered who most deserved to face
trial: "Saddam Hussein, who preserved the unity of Iraq, ... or those who
engulfed the country in this bloody civil war?"

No street unrest
was reported in Arab capitals, where Muslims were preoccupied with the Eid
al-Adha holiday, but thousands of Indians, mostly Muslims, staged
anti-U.S. protests.

Tajeddine El Husseini, a Moroccan
international economic law professor, said Saddam's "symbolic sacrifice"
on a religious day when Muslims slaughter animals would make things worse.

In Afghanistan, the first target before Iraq in the U.S.-declared
post-9/11 offensive, a Taliban commander said Saddam's demise would
galvanise Muslim opposition to the United States.

"His death will
boost the morale of Muslims. The jihad in Iraq will be intensified and
attacks on invader forces will increase," Mullah Obaidullah Akhund told
Reuters by telephone.

In Shi'ite non-Arab Iran, Deputy Foreign
Minister Hamid Reza Asefi said the hanging of the man who led Iraq into a
costly war with the Islamic Republic in the 1980s was a victory for
Iraqis.

But Yousef Molaee, an Iranian international law expert,
also took the view that the dawn execution was a failure for justice.

"Saddam's crimes in the eight-year war against Iran, such as
chemical bombardments, remained unanswered because of the hasty and unfair
trial," state news agency IRNA quoted him as saying.